This wording caught my eye (boldface added): "Mask mandates were instrumental in controlling the spread of the coronavirus during the peak of the pandemic. In the winter of 2020-2021, when nearly 4,000 Americans were dying per day, many saw face coverings as an alternative to the shutdowns of spring 2020. Mask-wearing was seen as paving the way for people to return to churches, schools and restaurants. The nation’s embrace or rejection of mask-wearing soon split along political lines."
Did the masks actually work or did they just help people "see" themselves as safe enough to return to something like normal life? Why am I even asking that question? I'm allowing myself to "look" like I'm on one side of a political line. Are masks mandates coming back because "many" are "seeing" a need to express where they are politically? By asking these questions, I know how I risk being "seen" by "many."
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Seeing Fauci's face again on the news page, seeing Biden masking and unmasking next to a Vietnam-era MoH recipient his same age, even seeing the latest on Trump's indictments ... can we just go into a different branch of the multiverse, please? This branch is full of crazy.
Why am I even asking that question?
Although you can’t smell bullshit you can see it?
By asking these questions, I know I how I risk being "seen" by "many“
…and it’s the dilemma of our times: choosing the path of least resistance, where you choose to accept (or try to ignore) the lies, the deception, the ‘bullshit’, or is it time to decide you can’t pretend anymore or that it isn’t worth it anymore?
There is no proof of this statement: “Mask mandates were instrumental in controlling the spread of the coronavirus during the peak of the pandemic.”
You’d think a paragraph that starts with that statement would back it up in succeeding sentences. Masks were only for show as they didn’t stop any transmission of the virus, but they did give people a belief they were safer if wearing one. A false belief that, but getting out and restarting life was a significant benefit. Of course the self-selected mask police were insufferable and still are.
N95, sealed with tape around the edges, changed out every day. Otherwise it has less than zero chance of doing anything.
Lets talk about masks.
40 years ago they didn't work. The latest study finds mask don't effect the spread of respiratory viruses.
But by all means lets talk about masks. 3 years ago mask discussions were considered domestic terrorism....so lets talk about masks now, since we were forbidden from talking about the firest time around.
How we supposed to respect our medical advisors, if they refuse to be honest with us?
(saw my primary care DR, Tuesday. She was not pushing the new vaccine. I'm old AND fat)
I relied on a blend of garlic and wolfsbane to ward off the virus. Many tests, no positives. no sickness. M.D. friend predicted a Bad Flu Season.
Mostly people in poor health died.
Life Is a Carnival.
If the purpose of mask was to avoid the shutdown and allow people to attend church, then objectively the masks did not work then, so why use them now?
Living near leftie bastion Lawrence, Kansas, I've seen this dynamic steadily for 3 1/2 years. Even this summer I've been amazed by the number of people wearing masks -- in the natural food stores, around campus [KU], in parks (20 metres from anyone), on the sidewalks, and so on. To the point I now consider it an intelligence test of sorts, given that nearly-countless global studies have proved masks essentially worthless for their alleged function.
As a farmer and field agronomist I have my own APR half-face rig -- non-powered, black/pink rated [for those who even know what I'm talking about] -- and it has been good fun occasionally to don it and show up where the face-diaper crowd is in common attendance, just to stir the pot by pointing out how useless their system actually is.
The shocker for me has been that 30 to 50 percent say "Oh, we know these don't work, but we just need to show everyone what it's like to CARE
I sense there's also another factor -- the fervent desire of many people to live a "risk-free" life. A security fixation if you will, to the point of willingly abandoning freedom and agency in return for a [false] sense of child-level security. Certainly that was obvious as early as '20. I could go into any tractor or equipment dealership, any parts outfit, or feed store, or large-animal vet clinic, or tire place, or welding shop, and so on. Nearly no one wore a mask.
Most probably because everyone there, including not a few female farm or business partners, was thoroughly accustomed to living with many assorted risks, and evaluating those risks to formulate an appropriate response. We'd figured out within a week or two that unless you were some combo of old, overweight, smoker, diabetic, etc ... there was no significant Covid risk.
Those places were islands of sanity.
Yes, masking became an unfortunate political football during the pandemic.
But ask those who deny masking had any possible salutary effect at all, even if patchy and incomplete, if they’d prefer their surgical team to go maskless during their next operation.
My wife is a clinician (ED-ICU) who spent countless hours caring for patients who had PCR proven, highly infectious levels of SARS-CoV-2 and she never contracted the virus. She was mandated to wear a properly fitted N-95 mask in her work with COVID patients just as she is mandated to wear a properly fitted N-95 mask when caring for patients with active TB, chicken pox and measles.
Anyone with a basic understanding of infectious disease transmission who cares for patients with COVID will tell you that wearing a mask does not provide a false sense of safety. Why is the efficacy of masks difficult to evaluate in the US? Because of skeptical people who don't understand disease transmission spread mis-information to the public making a healthcare provider's job that much more difficult. Perhaps they should stand next to physician in the Emergency Department and care for coughing infectious patients without a mask and see how long it takes for them to test positive for COVID?
I would also add -- masking didn't work because people didn't mask properly, or consistently. A recent CDC study reports that N95's reduced ones odds of infection by a factor of 6 relative to unmasked individuals. That's very significant in terms of reducing the rate of illness for vulnerable individuals, and useful for keeping hospitals from being overwhelmed.
Wearing a seat belt doesn't guarantee I won't die in a car accident. Wearing a mask doesn't guarantee I won't get sick. Having a smoke alarm doesn't guarantee I won't die in a fire. Never smoking doesn't guarantee I won't die of lung cancer. But as a statistics person, I like better odds.
The evidence that wearing a surgical mask for protecting against catching or spreading covid still seems unsettled as studies with conflicting results take turns making headlines. It's surprising to me that there is not evidence based consensus.
And yet, governments throughout the world are spending trillions of dollars to combat manmade climate change because of scientific consensus...all the scientists "agree"...about something as complicated with so many variables as climate...hmmph.
https://odysee.com/@TheSearch4Truth:8/trim.73AD9D52-2A52-433E-A9E1-DD8BF03AB4DE:d
About those masks…
{{{ experts worry people are more susceptible to getting the virus in this latest uptick because most Americans have not received the latest booster — including 80 percent of school-age children — and the newest variants are adept at getting around immunity from vaccinations and prior infections...."}}}
The newest variants are adept at getting around vaccinations. But experts are worried that people haven't been vaccinated.
Except that the variants are good at "getting around vaccinations" precisely BECAUSE the vaccines are not sterilizing and therefore viral evolution drives them specifically to evade the latest vax.
Oh, and the newest vax hasn't been released yet. And the newest vax is already a couple of variants behind. And the newest vax hasn't been tested at all, they just ran it past some mice and found some antibodies. They've no idea whatsoever what level of protection this vax will offer, and how long it will last in any case. Going by the rapidly-diminishing effectiveness of prior boosters, the one they are about to release will probably offer a small bump in protection for about six weeks.
The Cochrane Library study (January 2023) came to the conclusion that mask mandates made no difference in pandemic spread.
Show me the contrary study of equal weight and credibility, that makes the for mask mandates. As far as I know, there is none.
So how can mask mandates be regarded as anything other than political bullying?
The people pushing masking are people who never wanted to stop masking (some still haven’t stopped). It’s reflexive—they haven’t checked the science since the opening days, they know all they need to know. “Masks don’t work” is a right-wing conspiracy theory.
COVID is so mild now that we can’t track how many people have it because most people don’t report it or don’t even know themselves, but that’s not evidence it’s not as big a worry, it’s evidence we need to be more careful.
widespread mild cases
Can anyone give me a BETTER reason, to suspend civil liberties? than "widespread mild cases"
If "widespread mild cases" don't mandate throwing away the Constitution.. WHAT WILL?
I would also add -- masking didn't work because people didn't mask properly, or consistently.
So it’s like communism.
I was at the Art Institute of Chicago last weekend. A good number of masks were being worn by people carrying NPR bags. Science!
She was mandated to wear a properly fitted N-95 mask in her work
There's the tub, isn't it?
The other rub: your wife was dealing with people who were sick enough to be in the hospital. We're talking about people who are not sick at all - who are healthy and out living their lives. Why should they mask? Even less so, why should they wear an N-95 tight enough to leave angry marks on their faces?
If you're only addressing people's skepticism about mask efficacy, fine, produce the studies. I'm persuadable. But as to your "would you want your surgical team not to wear masks?" question ignores the fact that we all know masks ARE effective at preventing droplet transmission.
Well known facts:
1. Mask mandates do nothing to stop the spread of Covid.
2. Cloth masks do nothing to stop the spread of Covid.
3. Properly fitted N95 mask or KN95 masks may offer some benefit.
4. Kids wearing masks at school does nothing to stop the spread of Covid.
So why are masks and mask mandates coming back?
The same reason people used to sacrifice animals or offer burnt offerings to the gods...to give humans the illusion of control.
So, if you need to have the illusion of control, by all means, wear a mask (or offer burnt offerings), but leave the rest of us alone.
Not only does mask wearing provide for an outside costume of obedience and paranoia, it is just about control. A comforting virtue signal for leftists and educators. Of course they want to force this on the kids. They can program them for life. Wear a mask. Cut your penis off.
It is also classic cult reidentification. It hides everyone's most personal attribute; their face.
"We don't need to education. We don't need to thought control".
BArt Hall pointed out..
"Oh, we know these don't work, but we just need to show everyone what it's like to CARE
I sense there's also another factor -- the fervent desire of many people to live a "risk-free" life.
these two things
show people you CARE
desire to live a "risk-free" life
So, a fun sociology experiment (if they allowed fun sociology experiments), would be to..
correlate public mask wearing, with public displays of BLM signs in front of houses..
I'd bet (dollars to donuts; which is to say: even money), that there is a VERY close correlation between the two.
WHY did someone put a BLM sign in front of their house?
show people you CARE
desire to live a "risk-free" life
Interestingly,
the next comment, was rich saying: THE ONLY REASON masks didn't work, is because we didn't wear ENOUGH!
IF everyone would Just get an infinite amount of vaxes.. and wear an infinite amount of masks..
Did the masks actually work or did they just help people "see" themselves as safe enough to return to something like normal life?
My wife and I both work in different parts of the health system. Both our offices are precaution maximalist--first to shut down, last to open up. Every other desk is blocked off for distancing, etc. Officially, we are still supposed to mask when we're away from our desks even though the office is usually nearly empty because we're still 90% work from home.
This isn't based on any science, no determination by experts that this is what safety requires. It's CYA--because we are part of the health system, it would be a PR disaster if we had an outbreak traced to in-office transmission. We have to be seen as doing everything we can to be safe. "Evidence-based" is not a consideration.
But because we are the health system, our actions have a trickle-down effect to other organizations and public spaces--if this is what the experts are doing it must be because it's what safety requires.
Surgical Masks stop bacteria not virus. That's why they are worn in surgery. If it makes you feel more secure to wear a mask I say go ahead and wear it. Just don't try to force me to wear one. If you believe they can stop a virus then logically you're safe from anyone not wearing one.
Oh, and PCR tests were not designed to detect Covid19.
So far only Breezy correctly noted the BS opening sentence. It’s accepted wisdom at WaPo that masks slowed the spread although no respectable study has validated that claim. Nor did outcomes vary by masking behavior.
The efficacy of masks notwithstanding, the CO2 level of inhaled air of a person wearing properly fitted N95 masks far exceeds that which is safe. Wear it for an hour in a potentially dangerous setting: no problem. Wear it all day for weeks: damage.
I was told - on good authority, on this very board - it was all a right-wing, catastrophic wigout to even suggest mandates were coming back.
FU.
Got a problem with it.
Call the cops.
"Did the masks actually work or did they just help people "see" themselves as safe enough to return to something like normal life?"
The story does incorporate both lines of thought. For instance, it says: "Mask mandates were instrumental in controlling the spread of the coronavirus during the peak of the pandemic."
so - masks worked
The very next sentence says:
" In the winter of 2020-2021, when nearly 4,000 Americans were dying per day, many saw face coverings as an alternative to the shutdowns of spring 2020."
So, masks would end lockdowns, Whether they worked or not was irrelevant.
And going through the story you can see that WaPo is reporting different personal attitudes toward mask effectiveness. Rosemary Hills school thinks masks stop transmission; many Red States have entire legislatures which think masks are completely ineffective.
What's missing is an evaluation of the evidence. And even the evidence is missing. If you are a conservative, you have read about the Cochrane Report. You've read that definitive evaluation we all wanted a couple of years back. But The Cochrane Report isn't mentioned by name nor are its conclusions discussed in the Wapo story. Wapo readers are still wondering. This is the real masking problem - the Wapo can stop information transmission. It's been excluding half the country from being hired (probably illegally) and now it's excluding the knowledge base that half the country has.
Study after study fails to find a decisive conclusion that masks offer a clear benefit, but the rebuttals always seem to be "but but but these studies are flawed and inconclusive and they don't prove that masks don't work !!! - rather than just admitting that there's not enough evidence to persuade one into thinking they are a significant benefit. Handwashing and sanitation are maybe better measures to employ, and the disease's virulence is fading as well. Maybe all these people are wearing masks so they won't smell the bullsh*t?
As a follow up to Tim M, I’ll add that our local teaching hospital/primary provider system Loma Linda University has a new and improved approach to mask protocols. If a patient is symptomatic (cold, flu, RSV, COVID) they should wear a mask when in the facilities. Some of the providers are wearing but I don’t think it means they are symptomatic.
So...masks didn't work then. And the vax prevented nothing then. But all of these will work now? For something that's less lethal today than the flu?
I think our 'leaders' are addicted to power.
I’m not interested in an uptick of mild cases. I’m only interested in a big uptick of hospitalization and death. I don’t care if it’s a widespread new variant. Unless it’s life threatening, I’m no longer interested. We all extended a lot of grace to the government and health care officials when COVID struck - it was difficult to know how to respond. That’s no longer true. We know a lot more. I’m less trusting and I’m more discerning - so far, I’ve just seen articles and lots of talk with no evidence that I should be concerned or even bother getting the next booster.
wildswan said..
This is the real masking problem - the Wapo can stop information transmission.
remember the WaPoo's mission statement: democracy DIES in darkness!
Even if masks were to work, mask mandates don't work.
We could give everyone a level 5 hazmat suit and mandate them to wear them all the time, and it wouldn't affect virus transmission at all.
Masks are just a tool. An ineffective one for virus blocking, but a tool nonetheless. Fauci said as much in the opening week of the outbreak.
We instead turned masks into a political weapon. It was useful on a sociological stance. It took the focus off of the origins of the virus (Labs in China funded by Fauci's NIH), and instead focused it on the talisman of protection (the mask). That then morphed into the talisman of the "shots". And then the boosters. These talismans allowed people to get on with their lives. But mandating them turned it into a political weapon. It divided the country.
The only way to truly stop the virus was to lock everyone down. But a true martial law lockdown. Not a lockdown for the laptop class while Walmart workers had to go work. A shoot on sight military lockdown with checkpoints, etc. A "our neighborhood just formed a local militia to keep out the other neighborhood" kind of scenario.
And even that wouldn't be guaranteed to work (it didn't work for China). That also would have killed far more than Covid did. Starvation, rioting, etc.
Instead we got a Marxist control system. You must get permission to go anywhere, you must wear this identifying mark, you must jump through these hoops. Please listen to our daily broadcasts on the status of the war with Eurasia. We're doing something for you. Orwell would have recognized it.
A government that can maintain control of a society for airborne virus mitigation is not conducive to a democracy.
Our society depends on, if I can paraphrase with the of Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones, "Friction, Baby" to function. To stay together.
Of course they want to force this on the kids. They can program them for life.
Wear a mask. Cut your penis off.
comparison contrast with: Wear a burka. Cut your clitoris off.
SUBMISSION!
I find that masking helps in seeing Karen assholes.
"experts worry people are more susceptible to getting the virus in this latest uptick because most Americans have not received the latest booster."
Which don't stop you from contracting the virus.
Reflecting back on the lockdowns and their aftermath, no one should be seen to take mask-wearing seriously.
Item: we tried to do our bit to keep local restaurants from dying throughout the pandemic panic. We wore masks in, were seated, took them off, and enjoyed 90 minutes of food, drink, and conversation. That was not rigorous masking, was it?
Item: we went to numerous social events. We wore masks in, got a drink, took our masks off, and never put them on again while socializing in groups ranging from six to 150 in numbers. That was not rigorous masking, was it?
Item: we got vaccinated and boosted twice, mostly to comply with local venue requirements to go to theater, music, and art events. (We live in the Peoples' Republic of Illinois, which was extremely dictatorial and repressive on this topic.) Having read more about the "vaccines", I mildly regret having made myself a hostage to fortune by taking these over-hyped and experimental drugs, but no ill effects so far. Did masking as outlined above help in any way? I doubt it.
Item: Neither my wife nor I have ever tested positive for Covid 19. I am sure I will get it some day, but like all respiratory viruses, it has become less deadly (and probably more contagious) over time. I doubt I'll get another shot. I'll never do any masking again, because the first time was so clearly a joke and totally useless. Places that require masking will lose my patronage.
A good European study warned that N95, or the cheapo Chinese Kn95 (which fail the 95% at 0.3 micron test at 50% rate) masks expose users to dangerous TVOC chemicals ( total of voc) that cause cancer. Does California require a warning that Masks are known by the State to cause cancer, like they have on all other suspect chemicals? I have never seen such a label.
Corona viruses are about 100 nanometers in diameter, properly worn N95 masks remove 95% of particles 300 nanometers in diameter. But masks stop large droplets containing viruses? The droplets are absorbed on the mask, and dry out, and the smaller viruses are sucked through by the pressure required to breathe through the mask. The mask does not make viruses turn the other direction and run away. Airborne viruses are drawn toward you and your mask by breathing, that is how you get air in your lungs, right?
Reduction of exposure to particles by filtration is a very difficult technical task. Moisture in exhaled air dampens the mask and reduces electrostatic filtering. In practice, self contained air source breathing units are used with full face rubber sealed masks.
Clue #2: Mask disposal would be a HAZMAT issue, as they would be grossly contaminated by wearer and exposure to the killer virus. Not strewn about willy-nilly in parking lots and trash barrels.
Win Win for Chicoms, as the "cure" came in boxes marked "Made In China". $$$$$$
Died of Covid-19 = Federal $$$$$ Died with Covid-19 not so much, therefore, every death was originally scored as "of".
Hospitals demanded mask compliance to avoid the P.I. Hounds.
"Maggie comes fleet foot
Face full of black soot"
The latest study finds mask don't effect the spread of respiratory viruses.
=========
do they affect other viruses ?
It has been reported the Biden administration is developing a dual use mask. After it's daily use, the mask can be utilized as a mail-in ballot.
"But ask those who deny masking had any possible salutary effect at all, even if patchy and incomplete, if they’d prefer their surgical team to go maskless during their next operation."
There are no atheists in foxholes.
Also, this is a motte and bailey that contrasts your strongest position (masks have some benefit in some situations) against your hypothetical opponent's worst position (masks have no benefits in any situation). It also allows you to ignore the deleterious impacts of masking.
Beside any of that, masks limit our ability to express ourselves, so I believe that mask mandates are illegal for that reason. It is also an intrusion by the government, when mandated, on my physical body, but we've now decided that is acceptable when legislated at the state level, but that still leaves the question of whether I can be forced to mask by executive decree.
Ann, I can see why you feel at risk. As someone who has labored mightily to maintain and protect your trademarked "cruel neutrality" for your blog brand, even asking a sane, logical, non-committal question that any normal person might ponder may be "seen" by "many" as inadvertent disclosure that in fact you are secretly on the right (i.e., "wrong") side.
No joke, after all these years, I still catch myself thinking, "wow, would I have said that in the faculty lounge"?
If mask mandates worked, there would have been a sharp break in the infection curves. Never happened. Masks don't provide protection and are detrimental to one's health.
I’m scheduled for a flight at the end of the month and I’m crossing my fingers that there be no mask mandate by then. If so, I’ll comply because, really, what other options are there? I have to go. But how I’m filled with dread at such a possibility. And it’s all for the sake of an ideology I refuse.
Kevin, exactly.
"Mask mandates were instrumental in controlling the spread of the coronavirus during the peak of the pandemic" they asserted without evidence.
Remember when that was the fun thing to do, to fact-check Trump in real time? Those were fun days. "Claimed without evidence" was a favorite. No footnote in the Washington Post, of course.
Even if you have a study or two that says mask wearing helped control the spread that doesn't say MANDATES accomplished anything--what were compliance rates, what was the cost/harm of the mandate, etc? That's apart from the ambiguity of what "controlling the spread" actually means--was infection reduced overall, was the infection transmission rate simply reduced locally but the overall rate was unchanged, what?
Oh well. The Science is Settled.
Face masks had negligible effects on COVID transmission. Every rigorous study of this under real world conditions have basically proved this since March of 2020, and the studies prior to the pandemic had reached the same conclusions about every other respiratory virus which is why masking wasn't recommended as pandemic policy prior to the pandemic.
You want to know what kind of mask you need to prevent breathing in a virus that is in the air? Look at what is needed to work in a BSL-3/4 level research lab.
However, I do encourage idiots to wear masks- it makes navigating life easier for me.
"...By asking these questions, I know how I risk being 'seen' by 'many.'"
And if you don't ask these questions, you risk being seen in other ways by many others.
Damned if you do, damned if you don't. How about you just go with what you yourself want? Or is your "selfness" a construct based on what others see? Or, rather, what you think they see?
Etc.
I think we're all suffering from a deep structural ailment: multi-lateral cognitive dissonance. We are bombarded with (simplistically) two streams of data about any given subject, here Wu Flu but climate change is another obvious one. The streams reach us at different levels: top-down is media drowning us with The Very Latest Most Urgent and Authoritative News, which commands our attention at the general level. Our task is to verify the news (how?) and then, if it is not obvious bullshit, to apply it to our situation: CNN says CDC says some doctor thinks masks are maybe a good idea, OK, does that mean I should start? Which one? Where? How? What do I tell my family? etc etc.
The second stream of data is bottom-up: the inductive empirical here-and-now of our actual lived situation: Aunt Mary said she knows a lady who got really sick last week and they think it's the New Wu Flu, should I cancel that dinner with her, because you never know? I'm not feeling so good myself, do I drop $15 on a test, and then what if it's positive, will my boss be OK with me missing the meeting? etc etc.
The cognitive load is staggering, and that assumes that the two streams are NOT dissonant. But IMHO they are. Which drives us crazy.
You're welcome.
Spot on. Wearing “ The Mask” is the same act as displaying a bumper sticker.
"Many" are "seeing" a need to use weasel words.
Me, I wouldn't mind at all if my surgeon didn't wear a mask during my next operation because. . . . .there's really diddly evidence that they do anything there either:
Examination of the literature revealed much of the published work on the matter to be quite dated and often studies had poorly elucidated methodologies. As a result, we recommend caution in extrapolating their findings to contemporary surgical practice. However, overall there is a lack of substantial evidence to support claims that facemasks protect either patient or surgeon from infectious contamination.
That's not the only study that has come to that conclusion, btw.
"Science" is chock-a-block full of things "everyone knows" that were never really demonstrated very well.
+1 to Kevin.
I wore masks in surgery for 40 years. They were to reduce bacterial transmission, not viruses. If someone is coughing, masks may help with aerosols. In China, many people wore masks in public, allegedly because spitting was so common in public.There is no evidence that masks prevent Covid, or the vaccine for that matter.
Blogger Dave said...
"But ask those who deny masking had any possible salutary effect at all, even if patchy and incomplete, if they’d prefer their surgical team to go maskless during their next operation."
Do you understand the difference in size between viruses and bacteria? Seriously.
"Mask mandates were instrumental in controlling the spread of the coronavirus during the peak of the pandemic."
Not that it would matter to WaPo, but has this been proved? Didn't mask mandates precede the peak of the mandates?
"Rich" joins the fools' club.
But ask those who deny masking had any possible salutary effect at all, even if patchy and incomplete, if they’d prefer their surgical team to go maskless during their next operation.
When total joint implants are being done, masks are not enough. "Laminar Flow" rooms and "space suits" are used by the team doing the implant. This is because masks are not enough even for bacterial contamination prevention and infected implants are a disaster. The USC university hospital had a whole floor of infected cases in spite of all the precautions.
“I would also add -- masking didn't work because people didn't mask properly, or consistently.”
This, I can identify w/. The reuse of “where’d I put that mask?”
I also will wear(if mandated) a mask to Mass b/c it calms the fears of the older people. It’s the fear I would want to assuage- I would not want to be the cause of fear. It’s so f/ked up.
Be best…
Notice the pro maskers say “slowed the spread”. NOT reduced the the spread. Slowing the inevitable not protecting a single soul.
N95 masks work, simple as that. Covid-19 is a respiratory virus and N95 masks can keep the ~20 nm (and bigger) Covid-19 particles out of your lungs. Period. Nothing else explains why hospital workers in NYC, at the height of the pandemic and surrounded by heavily infected and shedding patients, had a *lower* rate of infection than the general population. But too many people were quick to stop wearing their masks as soon as they heard that COVID cases had gone down or believed the false information that masks do not work. I also realize that after more than 3 years most of us are just worn out and try to return to pre pandemic conditions.
"Did the masks really work?" Here's my quickie Google report
Covid-19 virion size = 140 nanometers (0.14 microns)
Typical bacterium size = 1000 nanometers (1 micron), with smallest mycoplasma particles maybe 100 nanometers
N95 mask performance = blocks 95% of particles >300 nanometers (or maybe down to 100 nanometers).
N95 mask works against bacteria. But it was never intended to block tiny viral particles like Covid-19. I guess the blocking effect gets probabilistic at that scale --how useful is it to block 95% of a billion particles of a virus that is, hello, incredibly proficient at replicating if it can latch onto some of your ACE2 receptors?
I notice even “Doctor” Jill Biden refused the latest booster, so I have to believe its marginal value is less than zero.
The prescribed masks are ineffective because they do not control inflow and outflow of viral particles, and improper fitting, use, and disposal. They make excellent petri dishes, viral concentrators, and dust clothes.
“Corona viruses are about 100 nanometers in diameter, properly worn N95 masks remove 95% of particles 300 nanometers in diameter. But masks stop large droplets containing viruses? The droplets are absorbed on the mask, and dry out, and the smaller viruses are sucked through by the pressure required to breathe through the mask. The mask does not make viruses turn the other direction and run away. Airborne viruses are drawn toward you and your mask by breathing, that is how you get air in your lungs, right?”
Inhaling those previously exhaled virons should be just fine, right? You already have the virus. Maybe not. Part of getting a viral infection is viral load - low enough, and it might not catch.
But the bigger problem is that the studies that we see from the health experts are mostly models assuming droplet spread. That might be the case with symptomatic patients. That is essentially when you are coughing. But many, if not most, of those who are coughing, are quarantining, whether formally, or probably much more often, informally. You are coughing, maybe running a bit of fever, and what do you do? You try to stay home, maybe stay in bed, call in sick, etc. That is essentially self quarantining. But that isn’t the case for those who are presymptomatic or asymptomatic. They are running around, exhaling virons, and those virons are likely to just slip through even N95 masks. Slap masks on little kids, and they won’t keep their masks properly adjusted. Meanwhile, they all catch the virus from each other, because they are rarely symptomatic and kept home. Of course, they may get a runny nose, which they wipe with their hands, and they touch something, and another kid touches it… Turns out that the virus appears to be transmitted more by touch than by air anyway. Gloves may have been more effective slowing the spread of the virus than masks, but they wouldn’t have had the visual impact. Besides, they wouldn’t help everyone identify with AntiFA, which started masking several month before everyone else did, in order to defeat face recognition.
I found the point about masks being biohazards interesting. Of course, they weren’t properly handled, as such, and you have to ask how many people caught the virus through touching masks. Except that I don’t really care. At best, they might have slowed the spread of the virus a bit, but it was going to spread through most of the population, regardless. Serious masking might have moved a small part of the population into the less deadly, but more contagious, Delta, the Omicron variants. But, of course, we are 20 months into Omicron, and the new “scary” variants panicking everyone are all Omicron mutations, which means that they are almost assuredly even more contagious and less deadly. About the only people who should worry about them now are those who keep themselves fully Vaxed and Boosted, and, thus keep their immune systems depleted (from fighting the Wuhan spike proteins produced by the ModRNA in the vaccines).
“When total joint implants are being done, masks are not enough. "Laminar Flow" rooms and "space suits" are used by the team doing the implant. This is because masks are not enough even for bacterial contamination prevention and infected implants are a disaster. The USC university hospital had a whole floor of infected cases in spite of all the precautions”
Friend’s daughter is an RN, who spent the first half of 2021 working in a COVID-19 unit, wearing that sort of space suit. None of them caught it then. Six months later, she did. She is young enough (~30) that it didn’t really slow her down. The good news is that she decided she likes working as a traveling nurse, spending six months here, and six months there. Really good pay (best was in the COVID-19 unit, but that was in a space suit), and she gets to see where she wants to end up. Her mother, at least, wants her to come home, settled down, and give her grandchildren. Her younger sisters are likely to delay that for awhile, due to their career choices.
Places that require masking will lose my patronage.
Make them kick you out. Otherwise they won't realize.
"The only way to truly stop the virus was to lock everyone down."
They did that in China. They actually nailed doors shut.
It did not work.
As mentioned here before, I do not personally know a single person who died of Covid, nor do I personally know a single person who personally knows someone who died of Covid. And I live in a metropolis of millions.
This has nothing to do health, and everything to do with ensuring successful election fraud in 2024.
How many of you who think that masks don't work tell your surgeon not to wear one during surgery?
Must be time to bleach my shoes again.
“I would also add -- masking didn't work because people didn't mask properly, or consistently.”
If your plan requires that "everybody" do something "properly" and "consistently," then you don't have a plan: you have a hope, or a wish (and it is a wish that will not be granted).
Also, in regard to wearing a mask in public when you're sick: talk about a false sense of safety for others. There is no way that anyone is wearing an N95 tight enough (much less a surgical mask) to prevent your shooting a powerful jet of air and virus into the room each time you sneeze or cough. If you tell people to wear a mask when they have symptoms, they will assume that their doing so is preventing them from spreading virus, when it's not. The truth is much better: there is absolutely nothing you can do with ordinary civilian equipment to prevent yourself from spreading virus when you are sick except STAYING HOME until you are well.
The ONLY good thing about the stupid pandemic was that people stopped coming to work or class when they were snotting and hacking. I had averaged 2-3 colds per year since my kids grew out of the snotty years because I'm around a lot of students, and they live in hot, dry dorms, so they get colds. But even though I taught in person the entire time except March-May of '20, since then I'd had a total of 3 colds (and 1 was covid).
I can see it now: Some dingbat will say "It's ok. I'm wearing a mask" while coughing spraying mucus around the edge of their pathetic paper mask that is held on by a light rubber band.
P.S. Hospitals making people take off the masks they came in with to replace them with the new masks they handed out was so ridiculously stupid that I can only imagine that the procedure was developed by a committee of administrators. If you actually believe that surgical masks catch virus (which means you probably put up chainlink fence to keep mosquitos out of your windows, but leave that aside), then while taking off your mask you've contaminated the room with all the virus you've sprayed out, AND you've inhaled all the virus contaminating the room that OTHER people sprayed out. You've totally obviated the imaginary protection for all parties.
I proposed that the "Public Health Community" should adopt as a precept: "Thou Shalt Not Lie to People (Even 'for their own good')," and was told that would make Public Health impossible.
Which tells you all you need to know about the people running Public Health.
N95 masks work, simple as that.
No, they don't.
Simple as that.
"The prescribed masks are ineffective because..."
They're effective if your goal is to identify idiots.
"How many of you who think that masks don't work tell your surgeon not to wear one during surgery?"
How many of you who think this is a good "gotcha" question understand the difference in size between bacteria and viruses?
My gosh how I love the way this issue continues to constantly trigger the ignorant right. Once they rally for surgeons to operate without wearing the same supposedly useless masks then I will believe they are sincere.
Republicanism really has degenerated into an outright form of social dysfunction, or maybe it always was one. Getting noisy about some right to spread disease among and infect other Americans. It’s a party of Karens. Crashing economies, starting wars, busting unions and polluting the environment - as they spread hatred and misinformation among each other and turn the country into a West Virginia meth-town. They really are the party of evil, greed and stupidity all in one. AND they find it to be a source of pride!
Yes, they trap or at least help trap viruses too. Regardless of pore size.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/10/30/science/wear-mask-covid-particles-ul.html
Right-wingers like anything that increases death and disease. It helps them feel more free or something.
Blogger Dave said...
"But ask those who deny masking had any possible salutary effect at all, even if patchy and incomplete, if they’d prefer their surgical team to go maskless during their next operation."
Do you understand the difference in size between viruses and bacteria? Seriously.
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I didn't say it, but I see you addressed your comment later to the correct poster. Have a wonderful weekend.
"Friend’s daughter is an RN, who spent the first half of 2021 working in a COVID-19 unit, wearing that sort of space suit. None of them caught it then. Six months later, she did. She is young enough (~30) that it didn’t really slow her down. The good news is that she decided she likes working as a traveling nurse, spending six months here, and six months there. Really good pay (best was in the COVID-19 unit,"
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Is she cool with dosing Remdeathaspere et all within ho$pital death protocols?
I asked my surgeon friend about masks. He said he wears them so he won't spit in the wound. Nothing to do with viruses.
I guess you could apply the same thinking to walking around Chicago or San Francisco, but I'll take my chances.
hpudding appears to be a prissy bigot with a superiority complex.
“P.S. Hospitals making people take off the masks they came in with to replace them with the new masks they handed out was so ridiculously stupid that I can only imagine that the procedure was developed by a committee of administrators. If you actually believe that surgical masks catch virus (which means you probably put up chainlink fence to keep mosquitos out of your windows, but leave that aside), then while taking off your mask you've contaminated the room with all the virus you've sprayed out, AND you've inhaled all the virus contaminating the room that OTHER people sprayed out. You've totally obviated the imaginary protection for all parties.”
Mayo in PHX did that. Their excuse was that they knew the quality of their masks, but not of yours. That was a year and a half ago, and masks were already rare outside health care facilities (and schools), so most people just walked in maskless and used the Mayo masks. They were odd colors, so anyone trying to get by with, say, their Harbor Freight, masks (where I picked up a bunch of masks, after my Amazon orders got diverted to late ordering NYC), would stand out. Then, of course, you dropped your Mayo mask immediately after walking out the door - many never even making it to the trash receptacles. Given Mayo prices, I usually managed to walk out with a half dozen masks, figuring that if I were ever challenged, I could justify it by claiming that proper masking protocol requires frequent changes of masks. I kept this up, until I found my vehicle stuffed with several dozen unused Mayo obtained masks.
Hpudding has no wrinkles on his brain. That's why everything he posts is standard leftist boilerplate.
EVERYBODY is going to get Covid eventually. Anybody under 30 with no comorbidities have nothing to worry about. People over 60, like me, take your shots or your ivermectin and keep going.
Rusty,
Use your naso-oral betadine wash and and zinc/quercetin supps. Xclear if limited to Walgreens.
The rona jabs are shit for evryone...especially in repetition.
Bruce,
The mask issue was litigated re flu by nurses pre-covid. $omehow, they abandoned that.
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